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Listening with Your Eyes: Matthew Lipman

In the performance video segment from From the Top at Carnegie Hall, violist Matthew Lipman performs "La Campanella" from the Second Violin Concerto by Niccolo Paganini, accompanied by pianist Christopher O'Riley. Listen as Matt uses a variety of techniques for making different sounds on the viola. Can you hear double-stops, bowing, and plucking (pizzicato)?

In the profile video segment, we see Matt at his home outside Chicago. Though his viola lessons are a two-hour drive from where he lives, his family is dedicated to getting him there. Matt also likes to practice his viola in the bathroom, where he can hear and see himself play.

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In this profile video segment from <em>From the Top at Carnegie Hall</em>, we see violist Matthew Lipman at his home outside Chicago. Though his viola lessons are a two-hour drive from where he lives, his family is dedicated to getting him there. Matt also likes to practice his viola in the bathroom, where he can hear and see himself play.

Niccolo Paganini was an Italian violinist, violist, guitarist, and composer. Born in Genoa, Italy in 1782, he died in Nice, France in 1840. He is regarded as one of the greatest violin virtuosos of all time. He studied with his father starting at the age of five, when he began playing the mandolin. By age seven, he had moved on to the violin. At 18 he was made first violin of the orchestra of the Republic of Lucca, and his career was launched.

Paganini was an incessant improviser on the violin and experimented with many dazzling technical innovations for which he is still admired today. These include the use of harmonics, special tunings, and different bowing styles. He exploited staccato and pizzicato, using both the left (fingering) and right (bowing) hands to pluck the strings. Paganini's mastery of these techniques was instrumental in popularizing their use in standard compositions.

"La Campanella" ("The Little Bell") is the third movement (Rondo) of Paganini's Violin Concerto No. 2 in B minor. This theme has been used by classical composers, as well as in the scores for movies, video games, and a Japanese anime series about a music school!

To hear Matt play and read his "Top Ten Ways to Procrastinate When You Should Be Playing the Viola" on From the Top's radio program, check out From the Top.

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Funder:Exclusive corporate funding provided by Liberty Mutual. Additional funding provided by the Bernard Osher Foundation, the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, Helen and Peter Bing, and the E.H.A. Foundation.

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